this post was submitted on 08 Nov 2023
0 points (NaN% liked)

politics

18883 readers
3487 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

  1. Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
  2. Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
  3. Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
  4. No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive.
  5. Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
  6. No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

That's all the rules!

Civic Links

Register To Vote

Citizenship Resource Center

Congressional Awards Program

Federal Government Agencies

Library of Congress Legislative Resources

The White House

U.S. House of Representatives

U.S. Senate

Partnered Communities:

News

World News

Business News

Political Discussion

Ask Politics

Military News

Global Politics

Moderate Politics

Progressive Politics

UK Politics

Canadian Politics

Australian Politics

New Zealand Politics

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
top 27 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Then maybe they shouldn't run with a genocide supporting senior citizen as a candidate

[–] [email protected] -1 points 10 months ago

I was more caught on Hillary implying she's less popular than Hitler.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (3 children)

Maybe a politicker who brags about being mentored by Henry Kissinger, a war-criminal whose record matches that of Heinrich Himmler himself, shouldn't be referencing Hitler.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I guess you're one of those people who day that Hamas is exactly the same as, and has been doing the exact same as Hitler?

Nuanced, very nuanced...

[–] [email protected] -1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

Hamas is exactly the same as, and has been doing the exact same as Hitler?

A small paramilitary organization operating in occupied territory is doing the exact same as the Chancellor of a European industrial powerhouse?

I'm always a bit surprised when some terminally online guy tries to give people in Hamas this much credit.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Small paramilitary organization? Okay guys, we can call Isreal out for genocide while still acknowledging Hamas as a terrorist group that slaughtered 1,000 civilians, plus whatever else since then.

Hamas and Isreal both suck. The only people I care about are the civilians and dead kids.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Okay guys, we can call Isreal out for genocide

Can we? I heard that was anti-semitism.

Hamas and Isreal both suck.

One is a paramilitary response to the suffocating violent occupation of the other. Might as well denounce the Vietcong, the Spanish Republicans, or Nate Turner Slave Revolt as Terrorists. You wouldn't be the first.

But to equate the two is to equate the symptom with the illness. Even the fucking Times of Israel acknowledges that the Hamas movement is the direct result of Netanyahu's domestic policies. The Palestinian Authority has been denuded of all legal agency in a territory they cannot govern thanks to Israeli sanctions. Gaza hasn't had an election since 2006. There is no way for anyone in the territory to survive, absent the black markets and smuggling corridors maintained by Hamas paramilitary.

This is a deliberate consequence of the stated policies of the Israeli government.

So both Hamas and the IDF are creatures of the Israeli government. The only way to resolve this conflict is to effect regime change in Israel.

The only people I care about are the civilians and dead kids.

The only way to achieve that is a ceasefire. And Israel will not implement a ceasefire until its leadership is removed.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (2 children)

And yet, you have no problem using electronics built with slave labor.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Oh, look... another Holocaust apologist.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Can you tell me the name of the ethically sourced device you're using?

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

I don't discuss squat with genocide apologists.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

:-/

If you really wanted to set off a riot, you could say you're using a Huawei device. Then tear into these dorks by citing the peak standard of living of Chinese industrial workers relative to their global peers. No student debts. No medical debts. 90% of them own their own homes. Retirement at the age of 60 is the norm. Life expectancy that exceeds their Western peers. Higher GINI index ranking.

Lemmy.word hates China with a passion, and nothing drops napalm on a thread like mentioning how much better Chinese industrial workers have it than folks doing shift work in a Toyota plant in Georgetown, Kentucky or Tijuana, Mexico, much less a Mississippi carpenter or some poor bastard doing contract machinist work in lead-contaminated Flint Michigan. And heaven help these bastards if they're in the UK. People in that former heart of empire can't even afford groceries, while folks in Pacific Rim states like Vietnam and Malyasia have grown fat and happy.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Bit of a false assumption, isn't that? There is no ethical consumption under Capitalism, so trying to advocate for better while participating in an unjust system is a requirement for many people.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

There's no ethical way to run a nation. Lincoln was barely able to free the slaves and FDR couldn't end segregation. Hilary listening to Kissenger doesn't mean she supports everything he ever did.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 10 months ago

There’s no ethical way to run a nation. Lincoln was barely able to free the slaves and FDR couldn’t end segregation.

A hard, bitter truth

Hilary listening to Kissenger doesn’t mean she supports everything he ever did.

Absolute bullshit.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

"matches that of Heinrich Himmler", you mean the head of the SS and one of the main people behind the holocaust?

Have you ever considered that your life, and life in general would be better if you didn't have such absurd and shrill opinions?

[–] [email protected] -1 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Unfortunately, the American education system just kinda gives up teaching history after 1945. Otherwise, you might be more familiar with the US State Department sponsored coups and subsequent genocides in Latin America, the Middle East, Africa, and the Pacific Rim over the subsequent 40 years.

Kissinger absolutely was administering mass arrests and executions in US client states, from the overthrow of democracies in Iran and Egypt to the massacres of dissidents in Jakarta and Rio de Janeiro and Santiago to the arming of the Khmer Rouge and subsequent bombings in Laos and Cambodia. Say what you will about Himmler, but he only really had the reigns of a mid-sized European industrial power for a decade. Kissinger was instrumental in steering truly nightmarish foreign policies on an international scale for four times as long.

And when you look at how folks like Kerry and Clinton and Blinken consistently turn to the Kissinger playbook to advance US foreign policy in the modern day, he's got even more blood on his hands by proxy than that.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

But he... wasn't. He lost the presidency in 1932 to Paul Von Hindenburg (53% to 37%. not even particularly close) who later appointed Hitler under pressure to the channclorship (which was an appointed role) in 1933. Hindenburg died in January of 1934 and Hitler de facto merged the presidency and chancelorship into one office (Fuhrer). The story isn't "regular people put Hitler in power", it's "broken legislative systems are vulnerable to facists".

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (2 children)

it’s “broken legislative systems are vulnerable to facists”.

She would know all about that. Bernie was killing Trump in the polls. Hilary was neck and neck with Trump.

The DNC cast their votes for who was going to General. A winner was announced. Everyone started to go to the announcement and for the only time in DNC history, the announcement was rescinded and everyone was broken up into different groups. Hilary staffers were observed scurrying around between groups. Then everyone was forced to vote again. THEN Hilary was declared the candidate going to General.

It was all live tweeted. It was all loudly publicized, but noone seemed to notice. Noone seemed to care.

Of course she is now going to make a historically inaccurate statement that casts actual democracy in a bad light.

That hag needs to stay under her rock.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Don't forget that there are many, many appointed superdelegates who each have around 8,000 voting power each.

There were 618 pledges from DNC superdelegates in the 2016 nomination, equaling 4,944,000 voting power (meaning votes equivalent to ~5 million regular voters in the DNC). These are not delegates assigned to states but to specific groups and people in positions in the DNC itself.

For reference, 16,917,853 of the popular vote itself went to Hilary Clinton and 13,210,550 went to Bernie Sanders according to this eye cancer of a website. If all of the DNC superdelegates voted for Bernie Sanders, he would have won the 2016 DNC primaries, even though the DNC voters regardless that the actual regular DNC voters voted for Hilary.

Anyway, I'm only making a point that system was broken.

The DNC did reform this afterwards, in that, if the first ballot doesn't have an absolute majority then superdelegates will cast votes but otherwise, cannot (as a superdelegate).

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago

Nice rundown.

At the end of the day, I think the United States is just too damn big to run this type of system.

Red states are so entrenched in their beliefs and blue states are so entrenched in theirs, there is no way to cap them off with one cohesive federal government.

By design, every advancement is a crucial blow to the other side.

And then the real rub.

We have been at it long enough that there are not 2 parties. There is one mob of selfish egotistical asshats who struggle and toil keep federal office the best place to get richer and more powerful.

We keep calling it a government divided. IT ISNT. They are of one mind, taking a foot but making sure not to take a yard. Giving up a foot but making sure not to lose a yard. And every time the ball moves one half of The mindless masses feel validated, one half of The mindless masses feel violated, and the whole effort had an earmark on page 1672 of 3000 that assraped EVERYONE except the rich and the politician.

My betting money is on the fact that we will crumble like the USSR before I die. No grand civil war two electric Boogaloo. Just a pathetic crumbling.

The difference between US and the USSR is that we don't have a pre USA history/culture to fall back on.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (2 children)

I mean, there was a court case...

DNC's lawyers used the legal defense that they're a private party and can run anyone they want in the general, and because of that, it doesn't matter if they influence a primary election.

They flat out said primary elections are just a performative act, and the judge agreed with them.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Which is correct if you look at the history of how primaries came to be. Parties simply nominating someone is exactly what used to happen. The first Presidential primaries started in 1901, and they still don't even happen in every state. Plenty still use the caucus system, where a bunch of insiders (usually local people who have volunteered for the party in some capacity) take off a day from work to decide on a candidate. The caucus system has historically been far more susceptible tampering by powerful interests. It literally was a smoke filled room, and is where that metaphor started.

Primaries aren't some system enshrined in the Constitution or anything. It's just how both parties have evolved over time. The general population gets its say in the election later on. The system now is far more democratic than the one that existed 200 years ago (with the caveat that we don't have to stop with progress here).

Obama would never have gotten the nomination in 2008 if the caucus system was still the norm. The leaders of the party wanted Hillary.

That said, I think this approach would work better if there were more than two viable parties. If you don't like who the Democrats nominated, look the Green Party or Progressives Party or Send Billionaires to Guillotines Party. If they all put a candidate out there selected by party insiders, that's fine, just vote in the general for whomever you think is the best out of a wide range of options. It's far harder for corrupt party insiders to game the system in this scenario--for example, it'd be harder to have a place in all parties and setup the candidates you want so you win no matter what. It's only a problem because we have exactly two parties that matter. Treating multiple parties as private organizations who can nominate whomever they want under any system they want would be fine.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

Obama would never have gotten the nomination in 2008

Nope, Obama dominated the cactus states...

https://www.infoplease.com/us/government/elections/campaign-2008-primary-and-caucus-results

That's not the only thing you just said that I disagree with, it's just an objective fact and it's pretty much what the rest of your comment is based on.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 10 months ago

I actually think I vaguely remember this.

Thanks for reminding me.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (1 children)

I get it, but this take fucking worries me, dawg. The last time the Democrats played the "I don't have to try and appeal to you because the other guy is Hitler, lol" card, 'Hitler' won. It's even a little on the nose that this is coming from Hillary. I'm worried that they're falling into the same intellectually and politically bankrupt trap as in 2016, that they're aware that they don't have a meaningful platform besides "we're not republicans", and that they've somehow convinced themselves that this is enough. The republicans of 2020 and 22 also had that same absence of platform, absence of appeal, and just trying to coast on party brand, and look where that got them. Shit is on fire, we don't have time for these dumb fuck games, let alone for Trump to win again. C'mon guys, don't fuck this up.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 10 months ago

They’re gonna fuck it up.

Honestly, I truly believe that both Democratic and Republican politicians benefit from all the bullshittery going on - so of course they’ll actually do nothing to improve the situation for America’s citizens. As long as they get money and they get paid, they’ll say and do whatever the fuck they can, including fucking things up for us.

Probably not much better across the pond, but I am finding myself more and more looking up how to become a UK citizen because at least they have less zany shit going on from what I can tell.